


Sparks

by MogreyBennet



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Ben Solo Needs A Hug, Childhood Friends, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Injury, Injury Recovery, Magical Realism, Meet-Cute, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Principal Skywalker, Rey Needs A Hug (Star Wars), Soft Ben Solo, Soft Rey (Star Wars), Time Skips, but it's a good story to tell to prospective grandkids, kind of?, not really - Freeform, sorry about that, spoiler: they hug, veeeery short first chapter
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-17 23:49:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28608582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MogreyBennet/pseuds/MogreyBennet
Summary: Rey has been able to see other people's vibrance for almost as long as she can remember. She's also been strangely invested in a schoolmate's life because of this.orA cute little story about Rey's life, and how Ben literally fell into it. Timeskippy, a few chapters planned.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 7
Kudos: 19
Collections: Ijustfellintothissendhelp





	1. beginning

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone!
> 
> This is my first fic ever and I'm kind of nervous about posting, lol. I actually wrote this as an English assignment but changed the names from Ben and Rey to not attract ~suspicion~.
> 
> The au is kind of a modernish, magical realism as the force type? idek
> 
> CW: mildly graphic, but not gory, descriptions of injury. More in the end notes
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

Rey was eight and in class when she first noticed the colours. Twenty-nine sparks and bands and ribbons fizzled at the edges of her vision, dancing and spinning in the entire spectrum of colours.

After school, during the car ride home, she asked her friend about it.

“My dad says it’s normal,” she whispered, “and you know that Principal Skywalker shifts forms all the time. Didn’t your parents tell you about this?”

Rey sat, silently, on the bus and waited for her stop.

Rey was nine when she discovered that the colours reflected the states of people around her. During the school track event, electric blue had buzzed at her senses until a fifth-grader, positively vibrating with canary yellow sparks, tripped off the metal bleachers, tumbling down and down before hitting the ground with a horrifying crack. Shards of crimson and alabaster stabbed at her temples, sharp and agonizing, before becoming muted under the onslaught of sepia shock and fossil grey worry.

Rey was ten before the injured boy returned to school. His sparks were quieter now, pale lemon, and a little blurry. Sometimes she followed his sparks to the rooftop where they ate lunch, just the two of them, unspeaking, on opposite corners of the building.

One Tuesday, he didn’t show up.

Or Wednesday.

Or Thursday.

On Friday, he did show up, and Rey immediately noticed that his sparks had flared closer back to their former glory, settling at a watery daffodil.

Rey sighed and returned to her sandwich. She didn’t have any obligation to care about a random injured boy’s vibrance.

Rey was eleven when the boy fainted. She had been eating grilled carrots, mind wandering past the excitable pink flickers behind the school and the rich mahogany waves wafting out of the teacher’s lounge, when the daffodil sparks behind her suddenly collapsed into irregular splutters the colour of brittle parchment.

She dragged him down the stairs and through the cafeteria, ignoring the pine green stares and peachy giggles until they reached the office.

Rey pounded on the door. “Miss Holdo, there’s an injured student!” 

The nurse quickly opened the door and helped Rey lift the boy onto a cot, cerulean tendrils of calm intertwining with the familiar fossil grey. 

Apparently she didn’t have to stay with the boy, only telling Miss Holdo what had happened on the rooftop, before being politely pushed out the door and back into the school.

The boy returned, fizzing with faint buttermilk energy, four days later.

Rey was twelve when the boy approached her on the rooftop. He shuffled, staring at the ground, flickering butterscotch for three minutes and twenty-nine seconds.

“Hel-

“I-

They stopped. Looked at each other. Laughed.

“I never got a chance to thank you,” said the boy, haltingly. “I would have been in some major trouble if you hadn’t taken me to the nurse that day.”

Rey shrugged. “It’s fine. Anyone would have done the same.”

“But you did,” insisted the boy, “and I want to be friends--- if that’s okay.”

She smiled and raised her water bottle in a toast. “I’m Rey.”

He grinned right back. “I’m Ben.”


	2. friends (thirteen)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey's thirteen this year, and starting high school. New friends, meet older friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Hope you like. This chapter is minimally proofread.
> 
> No CW that I can think of, except brief mention of intentional minor injuries from sports.

At thirteen, Rey felt like she was the tallest and shortest she’d ever been simultaneously. Ben had blossomed into shy dandelion over the year, fluffy and skittish as the boy himself. Rey hadn’t put much stock in his physical appearance until---

“Hey!”

She spun around, grinning widely, feeling herself perk up with fern green zings. “Ben!” 

Rey faded into moss. She was five foot three at this point, dwarfing all her other classmates, but Ben had somehow convinced his errant growth hormones to stretch him up to five-seven. Rey couldn’t help but to compare his sparks to the sun the top of his head seemed to be reaching for.

Ben slowed to a stop, puffing. “Hey! What’s wrong?” The salmon tips of his ears peeking out of his hair complemented the edges of fossil grey worry very nicely. The effect was cute.

_ Cute? _

Shrugging off the offending thought, Rey pushed forward a grin. “Nothing, Sparky. You’re just ridiculously tall.”

“Sparky? That’s new.” He paused. “And five-seven isn’t that tall. My mom checked it lots over the summer, and apparently I’m average height for my age and weight.”

Rey ignored her tangerine disinterested interest. “I’m really excited for school, though. I can finally join you at the high school!” 

“Rey, high school isn’t that interesting. Really. It’s across the street from the elementary school.”

She smiled even wider. “Double the size!”

He sent her a truly put-upon grimace. “Double the homework.”

She started down the street, with a fleeting glance to make sure he was following. “Half the pranksters.”

Ben trailed resignedly indigo behind. “Their pranks are equally as dumb.”

“Come on, Sparky, I’m sure it can’t be that bad.”

Rey sat down hard on the bus stop seat with a huff. Ben shot her an amused look threaded with peach.   
“Don’t say it.”

His face, still annoyingly perched at five feet seven inches, smirked down at her. “I told you so.”  
Rey shrieked and threw a balled up paper at him--- then paled as he picked it up.

Ben was openly laughing now. “Let’s see what this is.”

“ _ First Day: Welcome to Chandrila High’s Grade 8 PE Class _ ,” he began. “This isn’t so bad.” He scanned through the first half of the letter, pulsing tangerine. Suddenly, a spike of magenta embarrassment. “Oh. Health.” He studiously ignored the helpful infographics smiling their way through detailed accounts of pubescent functions and blessedly made it to the bottom of the page. “It says you’re doing archery, that should be fun.”

Rey frowned, still sparking magenta and ears slightly pink. “Didn’t your PE teacher ban you from that for almost hitting Tallie in the elbow?”

“ _ That _ at least was an accident. Enric Pryde tripped Dopheld Mitaka during soccer,  _ on purpose _ , and I saw him today in English. He’s still in crutches.” 

A few weeks had passed, and Rey was doing fine--- great, even. She’d collected a close little group of friends for class-- Finn, a funny, sandstone-ribboning kid from science, Poe, athletic and fiery orange from PE, Rose, a super-smart, electric purple girl from math, and by proxy Rose’s Grade 11 sister Paige and her girlfriend Kaydel, who complemented each other’s lilac and periwinkle to a stunning effect. Rey hadn’t met Ben’s friends, a boy named Armie, who apparently after a phase of football watching preferred to go by his last name, Hux, a girl she’d only heard referred to as “Phasma”, and the infamous severely-sprained ankle Dopheld Mitaka. 

She was lying on Ben’s living room floor, him doing gentle stretches (“to offset any lingering pain from the fall”, Ben’s mom Leia had repeated), both pretending the algebra sheets on the coffee table between them didn’t exist.

“I have an idea,” she sparked excitedly. “A good one this time, too.”

Ben blearily looked up and immediately smacked his head on the coffee table. “Ow.”

“Well,” Rey blundered on, “what if we had a little party? Your friends meet my friends, best case we get along swimmingly, worst case we lose all our friends.”

“That… could work,” Ben agreed, the last of the ground-glass crimson making way to amethyst anticipation… only go deflate into indigo. “Wait, you didn’t factor in Mom.”

Leia, with an ever-listening ear, popped her head in. “Yes, dear?”

Rey looked up with the sweetest, most innocent doe-eyes. Only her well-masked bubblegum pink suggested any kind of theatrics. “Hi, Auntie Leia.”

“Yes, dear?” Leia repeated, with an azurely benevolent grin.

Rey inwardly grinned. Ben barely hid a groan.  _ This is in the bag! _

“Well, we were just thinking… as a sort of start-of school celebration, could we maybe haveourfriendsoverforaparty?”

Leia blinked, bemused ocean blue creeping into the air. “I’m sorry?”

Rey smiled, a small, shy pink. “Maybe could we have my friends and Ben’s friends over for a party? Just to meet everyone! Don’t worry, it’ll be totally safe, and Ben will be fine, and it’ll only be a few hours, please?” 

Leia glanced concernedly over at Ben. He was looking at Rey like she was a forest in spring--- bright, happy, new. She hummed for a moment before deciding.

“Okay,” ---Rey squealed, and Ben reactively jumped--- “but not too long, and let me call your friends’ parents first. We also need to see what your dad’s doing next weekend---and don’t think I don’t see that math homework on the table.” 

The next Saturday, Finn, Rose, Hux, and Phasma all arrived at 2pm on the dot. Dopheld had had a physical therapy appointment for his ankle, and Paige and Kaydel needed to study for a chemistry test. 

“Hi.” Phasma, zinging lime, spoke up first. Hux shuffled his feet.

Finn responded. “Hello.” Rose only afforded them a small, but kind, nod and wave. Rey groaned as she saw fiery orange out of the corner of her eye, blooming up to a spout. 

“Hello, all!”

Poe had arrived, slightly late, with his dog Beebee in tow. As he slowed to a stop, Beebee ran circles around Poe’s legs, tangling his legs in the leash and collapsing them both in the grass.

Han arrived, coming in from the backyard with Leia and Rey’s adoptive mom, Maz. “Are you kids just going to stand there all day? Come out back!”

The party was a hit. Five hours later, everyone had gone home and only Rey and Ben were left in the backyard, buzzing honey and basil in contentment. 

“It was pretty funny how Hux got hit in the stomach with the Frisbee,” Rey commented. “If he was actually hurt it wouldn’t be, but he wasn’t.”

Ben tried to wrap his head around her sentence. “I guess.” He bent down to pick up a fallen napkin. “He turned almost as red as his hair.”

Rey grunted as she began pulling the chairs into the garage. “It was kind of awkward at first.” From 2 to 2:15, Ben’s friends and Rey’s friends had stood on opposite corners of the yard, throwing furtive glances at each other while Ben and Rey set up a house of cards in the middle.

Ben hummed, stretching. They’d finally broken the ice with a card-building competition, where both Hux and Poe claimed innocence of a suspicious gale of wind that had broken both of the towers.

Sparkling with champagne-coloured satisfaction, Ben and Rey pushed the last chair inside. The sun was setting, seemingly anointing the new friendships in radiant streams of copper and dusky pink.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :)
> 
> In case you're wondering: Shockingly, I am not American, so I'm not using the American schooling system! Elementary school here is kindergarten (age 5-6ish) to Grade 7 (age 12-13ish), and high school is Grade 8 (13-14ish) to Grade 12 (17-18ish). The age you begin each grade depends on your birthday, but generally (disregarding skipping grades/being held back) you graduate high school the year you turn 18.

**Author's Note:**

> CW expanded: Ben falls from the bleachers as a kid and gets briefly pulled out of school. He also collapses/faints (not defined) and our awesome baby Rey saves him.
> 
> :) Have a great day


End file.
